


Understand

by stabbyunicorn



Category: Parahumans Series - Wildbow
Genre: Gen, Madison is the worst, Trans Female Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-06
Updated: 2020-04-06
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:08:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23504368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stabbyunicorn/pseuds/stabbyunicorn
Summary: In which Sophia understands, Emma doesn’t, and Madison’s the worst.
Relationships: Emma Barnes & Sophia Hess | Shadow Stalker, Emma Barnes & Taylor Hebert | Skitter | Weaver, Taylor Hebert | Skitter | Weaver & Sophia Hess | Shadow Stalker
Comments: 9
Kudos: 59





	Understand

**Author's Note:**

> writing experiment, may delete later (not really) (the delete part) (it is indeed an experiment exploring the physicality of my perception of emotion, and various injuries—most notably nerve damage—I have experienced)
> 
> Content warning: A rather transphobic scene.

“Look at him, Em.”

But how could I look anywhere else, with him how he is? How— how, when to look away is to forget, and to forget is impossible, and the mere thought of attempting twists so terribly at my lungs and cheeks…

“Weak,” I hear myself say, off in the distance as if through water, as if in my imagination, as if I might not have spoken at all. Still I must have spoken, for why else would my cheeks so strain to rearrange themselves into a facsimile of a smile?

How could I manage a smile when I can scarcely manage to hear the words leaving my own lips? What does smiling mean to me when there Taylor sits— _still he sits_ —and still my eyes refuse to budge away, still they remain on him, _him,_ old friend instead of new, instead of Sophia, _Sophia,_ Sophia who rescued me, who taught me, who was my everything, is _still_ my everything…

Finally, I tear my gaze to her, and she is no more capable of a smile than I.

“No, but _look,_ ” Sophia says. “Look at him. He… He…”

Again my eyes return to the personification of all I detest. He is who I cannot be—must not be—and so I killed him, and yet still he so lives and yet there he still sits, there but a few circular tables away, there, alone, _there_.

Madison hadn’t tried to bother him in weeks, not at lunch anyway, and Greg— Well, poor Greg had tried to sit by Taylor not two weeks ago. The sound of the table’s legs screeching as Taylor’s fists crashed into its surface with all of his strength— How many times had he destroyed that table? And how many times had the sound of its screeching legs played through my head?

And though the impact must have been excruciating, with all that had happened and him as he was, Taylor’s grimace had swiftly turned to bitter scowl as he’d stared down at the wrecked table his hands had left behind.

Why had he scowled? Why? He had _strength_ behind his fists, had _power_ —

But then, perhaps it was those fists, that power, that had so galled him, for what was a fist when he couldn’t coerce his fingers around his fork without his shaking hand dislodging its contents; what was power when he could only write with a keyboard, and even then his damaged nerves would scream with pain; when he couldn’t do so much as run his fingers through his hair without lines of tension pulling taut across his face, and that face—

That face. His wide mouth used to—

“He used to be…” I mutter, or else I think I do, but still it’s hard to tell. “He used to— He’d smile, sometimes, and…”

I never see him smile anymore.

“Now…” Sophia says, though I cannot place her tone. “Now he’s so…”

 _Different,_ I want to say, but my traitorous mind provides a different word, a word I cannot bring myself to say, a word I am no longer sure I believe, a word that, even in the face of all I’ve done in the name of my own strength, of all I’ve done to leave behind Taylor and the naïveté he’d come to represent, now seems too cruel, too _reprehensible_ to say or think— To think that this _word,_ of all things, feels so reprehensible after all Sophia and I have done, after all the times I’ve called him the very same word—

 _Pathetic,_ my traitorous mind whispers in my ear, whether at me or Taylor it no longer matters, and perhaps it never had.

But Sophia chooses a different word.

“ _Here,_ ” she says.

“Here?” I ask. I don’t understand.

“He’s still here,” she repeats. Her face— what’s wrong with it? Where are the assured, strong lines to which I always could look, always _did_ look? Why do her muscles dance in microscopic motions that I can’t ever hope to decipher? Is she confused? Disturbed? It’s as if something in her has cracked and broken and left her adrift.

“And…” I start. “You want to— to fix that? To…”

My stomach turns and twists angrily, and though I know I’m in the cafeteria, suddenly I can see only _him,_ only _Taylor_ , and the only memories I can summon are words, words I spoke to him not so long ago:

_Can’t you tell, Taylor? You’re not wanted, here. You should’ve stayed in the hospital. Why don’t you just leave, already?_

But Taylor hadn’t stayed in the hospital and he hadn’t left the school, and I know that were I in his place—

“No,” Sophia answers, bluntly, but—

What had I asked? By the time I remember— _‘He’s still here.’ ‘You want to— to fix that?’ ‘No.’_ —Sophia turns on her heel and strides away.

And still my eyes cannot leave him.

I don’t understand.

* * *

“Here,” Sophia says, a few weeks later. Brave as ever she was, she sits down just to Taylor’s right, and however unwise it might be, I somehow still find myself sitting by his left.

Taylor startles and jumps as naturally he would—what had Sophia expected? His hands splay flat against the table’s surface and his fingers stretch taut, and I cannot help but wince at the pain I see so briefly flash across his face before he can shove it away; _down and to the left,_ he always used to say, back when we talked. _Pain goes down and to the left._

Sophia pretends she noticed neither his reaction nor his pain, and instead slides over her prize: a wooden box. It’s quite small and yet still five times larger than it strictly needs to be, with inlaid characters either etched or burnt into its lid— I hadn’t bothered to notice which; it hardly matters.

“Get away from me,” Taylor says. “Get away, or I’ll— I’ll—”

The tabletop beneath his fingers creaks and crunches as he digs his fingers into its surface. It ought to leave me frightened, for strong though Sophia may be, Taylor is— well, Taylor is how he is.

But though I _was_ frightened, I did not fear his fists. Perhaps it would have been different a few weeks past. Perhaps the possibility of violence would have been the frightening thing. But a few weeks past, Sophia had not made me come clean to Dad, and Dad had not come clean to the school, and the presumption of guilt had not been laid down so firmly upon our shoulders. Madison still wouldn’t talk to us, and I still don’t know why I had agreed, except that—

“Sorry, sorry,” Sophia mutters, raising her hands and scooting a few inches away, as if such a short distance could make any sort of difference. I try to roll my eyes at her, but they don’t properly cooperate, and when Sophia shoots me a glare, I find myself scooting away as well.

“If you think I’m opening anything you—”

“Right,” Sophia says, but underneath her calm voice there’s something, something accompanied by a quick twitch of the muscles in Sophia’s jaw. What is it? Pain? Anger? No— no, it’s something else; a particular sort of grimace that’s grown ever more familiar as the weeks past, a grimace representing something I—

“Sorry,” Sophia says again. She reaches for the box slowly, gently, as if any sudden movement might spook Taylor—which, in all fairness, it might. “Sorry, I’ll do it. It’s from Uncle Alan more than us, if that helps. But, like, it _was_ our idea and so it _is_ from us, too…”

Her reassurances do little to soothe his nerves; his eyes dart down the cafeteria over to where some teachers are finishing their lunch. Mrs. Ahlers is watching us carefully; there’s always a teacher watching us, lately, and I feel myself grimacing that same, familiar grimace as I find myself deciding I cannot blame them.

The soft grating of the wooden box against the table’s surface draws my attention back to Sophia just as she opens its lid.

Inside lays an oversized fountain pen, beautiful and shiny and in the deepest of purples. As I look at its glossy surface I can almost feel its particular sort of smoothness beneath my fingers— but then, the damaged nerves in Taylor’s hands won’t be able to feel that smoothness, will they?

Sophia reaches for the pen, then suddenly pauses. She shoots Taylor a look—

“May I?” she asks him, to which he responds with an incredulous glance.

“ _You’re_ the one giving it to him,” I mutter. “Still say we should’ve gone with black—”

“ _You_ said he _liked_ purple,” Sophia says, her voice dipping into condescension. “This _is_ for him, isn’t it?”

“Like he needs another thing to be mocked abou—” I begin, but at Sophia’s raised eyebrow, I fall quiet. But does she not realize it was never just us who tormented Taylor? Madison would be delighted to see his new pen, though she’d surely know better than to touch something _quite_ so valuable.

“ _He,_ ” Taylor says, with an unpleasant, grimacing sneer, “is right here.”

“Sorry,” I say, automatically, but as something leaps beneath my sternum I find myself second-guessing my words and— “I mean— I mean, I _am,_ but not just about— I mean, we, that is, this pen is—”

“Emma, shut up,” says Sophia.

After another glance at Taylor, she wraps her fingers around the pen and lifts it gently from its case. She unscrews the caps—one and a quarter turns, Dad had noted, as if that were at all important—and places the cap nearly lovingly back into the case.

“It’s urushi,” Sophia says, to which Taylor hardly raises so much as an eyebrow. Does he not remember all the things Dad used to say about his pens? “Japanese lacquer,” Sophia clarified, her voice low.

But the pen had been hideously expensive far before it had become rare. How much must Dad have spent? It must have cost thousands, maybe even tens of thousands…

Taylor’s mouth dropped open, and something catches in my throat.

I used to adore shocking him so… I’d find such disgusting things—worms and frogs and even moldy bread—and Taylor would squeal and yell my name and giggle and—

“We said we wouldn’t sue,” Taylor says quietly, even bitterly. For they hadn’t said they didn’t _wish_ to; only that they couldn’t _afford_ to. At the time, Dad had still thought it had all been some convoluted misunderstanding; that one day, we might all laugh it off…

“No,” Sophia says, brusquely. “This isn’t about that. Look.”

She withdraws a notebook from the bag by her feet, and Taylor jumps at the sudden motion. The notebook is as vibrant a purple as the pen; we have a box full of them at home in case Taylor needs.

Sophia flips it open and holds the pen above the first page.

“See the barrel?” she asks Taylor. “It’s nice and wide, even the section—”

“The _grip_ section,” I find myself clarifying. I’ve never been as enamored by pens as Dad, but where Dad had failed to infect me with his passion, he’d succeeded with Sophia. “She means the grip section.”

“Right,” said Sophia. “My mom said gripping thing’s difficult sometimes with neuropathy—she’s a physical therapist, and the gaba— uh, gabapentin can only do so much—anyway, the pen’s big and writes really smoothly. We had the nib custom ground so it glides right across the page…”

Taylor stares blankly at her.

“Watch,” Sophia says, gently setting the nib upon the paper. Then, moving her whole arm, she begins to write. I never got into the habit of moving my whole arm, though Dad’s always swears by it.

 _Taylor,_ Sophia had written at the top of the page, in elegant letters with delicate swirling ends.

That done, she deftly turns her hand and extends the pen towards Taylor.

“You try,” Sophia says. “Go on.”

Taylor looks at the pen distrustfully. Sophia sighs.

“The teachers can see us,” Sophia says. “Mrs. Ahlers is _watching_ me give it to you. It’s okay.”

Taylor opens his mouth, then closes it. Words failing him, his face falls completely neutral, almost as if now, instead of pushing pain away down and to the left, he’s pushing fear, pushing anger, until there’s nothing but himself and the pen. And finally, face blank, he slowly extends his arm and accepts the pen in his shaking hand.

Sophia slides the notebook over.

“Okay, so,” Sophia starts. “Gently rest the nib on the paper. Don’t press. Just let gravity do the work, alright? Okay, now write— no, don’t use your wrist. Keep it in a neutral position.

“No, no— look, you want your hand within five degrees of straight, just like— yeah, like that. See, up or down would stretch the nerve. No, side to side stretches it, too. Keep it perfectly straight.

“Your muscles are pretty tense, aren’t they? That’ll put pressure on the nerves, too. Keep your hand relaxed. That’s why we got you the big section; just hold it, don’t squeeze. Just let it rest. There you go…

“It’ll take some practice, but you’ll get the hang of it. You’re… Well, you’re—”

Taylor’s face had remained neutral throughout Sophia’s impromptu lesson, but now, suddenly, it twists into an ugly scowl, and with it, a strange, painful expression twists across Sophia’s face.

“You’re still here,” Sophia says, quietly. “After everything.”

“Fuck you.”

“Yeah,” Sophia says. “Fuck me.”

For awhile, Sophia just sits there, not meeting Taylor’s eyes.

“I’m sorry, you know?” she says, finally. “Like, I know it doesn’t mean much, okay? But I am. And I think I need to say it so that you know that I— that I— I mean, it should have been obvious that it was fucked up, but I guess it wasn’t to us, or we didn’t care, and—”

“Which was it?” Taylor snaps, a sudden flash of anger breaching his impassive mask.

“What—”

“Was it not obvious that this— _this_ —was wrong?” he hisses, gesturing at himself, and I want to scream that we’d never wanted _this,_ never _this,_ but— “Or did you just not _care_?”

And I try to tell him, I try.

“We didn’t want _this_ ,” I say, but then I remember—

“‘You should have stayed in the hospital,’” he quotes back at me.

“It’s— I—”

“Don’t try to pretend, Emma,” he barks. “Fuck you. Fuck _both_ of you.”

* * *

“You can’t _buy_ my forgiveness,” Taylor says a few days later, shoving the wooden box at Sophia. His eyes meet hers briefly. They don’t meet mine.

Sophia snorts and shakes her head.

“Tell Uncle Alan that,” she mutters.

“Yes,” Taylor snaps. “Do. Please _do_ tell him.”

Again he shoves the box at Sophia, but she only turns away.

“He’s not taking that back, you know,” I say quietly. “He knows.”

“Knows?”

“Everything,” Sophia says. “We told him everything. Look, I just asked him to get you a simple pen with a big barrel, and maybe something to wrap around the section to make it bigger. It shouldn’t have cost more than a couple hundred. _He’s_ the one—”

“A couple hundred?” Taylor shrieks. “A couple— that’s a _cheap_ pen to you?”

“Well, not _cheap,_ but it’s not like it’s— I mean, people give each other gifts like that, don’t they?”

“They give _friends_ gifts, maybe,” Taylor says.

“We could be friends,” Sophia floats. “If you like.”

Taylor stares at her, his face twisting in revulsion.

“What the _fuck_ is wrong with you?” he demands.

“Quite a lot, to be honest,” Sophia admits.

But she lets the matter drop.

Taylor takes the pen. Perhaps that’s victory enough.

* * *

“Why do you even bother?” I demand of Sophia. She had taken to carrying Taylor’s bags for him, and now Sophia was waiting patiently as he went to the bathroom.

“It’s the least I can do,” Sophia says, quietly.

“He’s not even grateful,” I say. He still would hardly ever acknowledge me, although _Sophia…_

“Still.”

“Fine,” I snap.

Just _what_ is Taylor doing in there? It must’ve been over five minutes, now. It never took _me_ so long.

“Want to go to Sal’s after school?” I ask Sophia, though I know she already has the afternoon booked tutoring Taylor in physics. Perhaps that’s why I—

“Can’t,” Sophia says, tightly.

“Sal’ll have new flavors,” I press, though even I can tell I don’t really care about the frozen yoghurt. “Come on…”

“Can’t.”

“Fine,” I say.

But I can’t let it go. I try, I do, but it’s like an itch in my throat and I can’t stop myself from—

“We gave him the pen, okay?” I finally snap. “We’ve done what we can, and now— now—”

I don’t understand.

“I help my friends,” she says, as if it were so simple. “I helped you when you needed it.”

“He’s not me,” I hear myself say, but something’s crushing my lungs; I can hardly— “You’re _not_ friends. You can’t—”

“Em… I can be friends with both of you, you know,” Sophia says, but I can’t understand her words. Still, I—

“No,” I say, my breaths quick and rushed, and I can barely tell what I’m answering. “No, you can’t—”

“Friends don’t make each other choose, Em.”

“You’re _not_ friends,” I say. “After all the things you’ve done to him—”

“ _We’ve_ done to him.”

“That _we’ve_ done,” I say in a rush, trying to chase the strands of thought that beg me to speak them. “You’ve—”

“Are you still proud?”

And suddenly the strands of thought crash into each other and tangle in twists and shards and I— I—

“Am I— am I proud?” I ask. “Of— of—”

“Of tormenting him,” Sophia says, as if it were an everyday sort of conversation.

“I— I’m not— But you—” I reach for the anger I’d felt, but all I can find is— “If you’re forcing yourself to be his friend as some sort of penance, that’s— that’s twisted, even for…”

“Even for us?”

“You’ll turn on him, Sophia,” I say quietly, and suddenly I can see it: just as _I’d_ turned on him, so would she, and just the thought of it threatens to suffocate me. “You will, you know you will.”

“I don’t think so,” Sophia says. “And it’s not just penance, anymore.”

The corner of her lip pulls upwards just slightly, less a smile than a sad nod towards one, and it takes a moment for me to realize that it’s not for me: Taylor had finally left the bathroom, his eyes red and raw.

And then they leave.

I don’t follow.

* * *

Madison struck a week later. She’d taken Taylor’s purple notebook, and now there he stands, so small amidst the crowd as Madison reads from it victoriously.

But it’s all wrong.

Taylor isn’t supposed to be like this; isn’t supposed to be so small. He’s weathered storm after storm, more than most ever have to face, and he’s still here—here, just as Sophia had said, which was to say, she’d said he was strong.

I don’t understand. If he is so strong as to weather so much, how can he now be so small?

What has Madison found?

I search for Sophia— but no, she’ll be in her violin lesson for another few minutes. Taylor’s alone.

“Poor little Taylor Hebert,” Madison crows, her face alight with glee. “Or should I call you _Annette?_ Tell me, Taylor, have you always wanted to be a girl?”

I don’t understand.

Somewhere, Madison is giggling, and somewhere, the crowd is uneasily laughing along, but all I can think is how I don’t understand.

What is Madison talking about?

Did Taylor really write such things?

Does he— Does Taylor really want to be—

“Annette Taylor Hebert!” Madison’s cackling voice echoes into my awareness. “I guess _this_ is why you grew your hair out so long—”

“Shut up!”

Silence.

What happened? Did Sophia arrive? Who had yelled?

But as I search the crowd, I realize that their eyes have all landed upon me— _me_ —and I remember that _I_ had yelled, _I_ had demanded that Madison shut up, _I_ —

I find myself moving. One step then another, then I push the crowd aside and—

My hand shoots out and seizes the purple notebook from Madison’s _stupid_ hands and—

“Don’t tell me you’re _friends_ with this—” Madison begins, and only now do I realize that everything had become muted, that I’d shoved all my thoughts and emotions away, shoved them down and to the left like Taylor had always done; only now do I realize, as only now does it come rushing back with the ferocious roar of a wave crashing ashore and—

“I said,” I say, feeling that _rage_ swelling up from between my lungs. “Shut. The fuck. Up.”

I shove the notebook towards my once-best-friend, and I feel it taken from my hands as I stare Madison down.

“But if you _read_ what _that_ wrote—”

“Fuck you, you—”

And as I launch myself at her, I feel hands grab me, and I feel myself lifted and set aside like little more than furniture, and then I see Taylor—

But she’s not Taylor, is she? And perhaps it doesn’t matter, or perhaps it matters more than anything, but right now—

Right now, what mattered was her, standing there in front of Madison, standing _tall_ , standing _angry_ , but _standing_ —

It doesn’t make any sense.

She glances over to me with her usual sneer of distaste, but it’s undermined by a hint of reluctant softness; then, suddenly, her gaze leaves me and returns to Madison.

Annette Taylor Hebert takes a step forward, and stands, arms loose at her side, and stares calmly at Madison.

She does not threaten. Does not raise her fists. She simply stands, her eyes red and puffy and wet with tears, her face straining to remain firm, chin jutting out, determined…

A moment ago she’d been so diminished, and now—

I don’t understand.

How can she change so? How can she be weak one moment and strong the next? How?

I don’t understand.

But then, perhaps I do… And I wonder if this is what Sophia understood weeks ago; if this was what had left her so confused and disturbed; if this was what had rendered her so adrift…

Annette Taylor Hebert is _here._

Strength, weakness— what were they to her, when weak or strong, she’s still _here_?

I understand.

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so the big problem here was I didn’t want to make Emma or Sophia into any sort of savior for Annette, but I _did_ want to give Emma an opportunity for character growth, and for her to be the protagonist of the story. This, it turns out, was difficult to balance. I always seem to make things complicated.
> 
> I think this turned out rather melodramatic, but yolo, I’m publishing it.


End file.
